Can't Handle It
by bubbles2100
Summary: Four years after Lucy, Jasper hasn't been upholding his end of the deal. When Maggie leaves, he becomes Mr. Mom while she discovers new things about herself in a new city. Sequel to Break Her Down, which should probably be read first.
1. Chapter 1: When Things Crashed Down

**Disclaimer: I don't own Unnatural History. I own Lucy. **

**A/N: Aww. After I finished **_**Break Her Down**_**, I got all of these really sweet reviews and I knew had to write something else, but I wasn't sure what I should write until I got this idea. I hope you love it as much as you loved BHD, because this idea just came to me and I can't stop writing it. :) That being said, I should be updating quite quickly.**

**Thanks for all of those kind reviews for **_**Break Her Down**_**, I love all of you. 3 XOXOXO **

**I'd love it if you would review- it's like fuel for me to write more.**

Chapter 1- When Things Crashed Down

_She smiled when Lucy closed her eyes and didn't open them again. Finally, her little girl was asleep. As soon as she had the light turned off and the nightlight switched on, Maggie padded back out into the empty kitchen to prepare her coffee machine. She was supremely tired. Having to raise a two year old on her own was difficult. _

_For some reason, Jasper completely stopped helping so he could work. He just worked- that was his life rather than her or Lucy. It made her mad, yes, but she still loved him, she was still devoted wholly to him, and she still gave him a chance to help with their daughter even if he didn't take her up on it. _

_When she lay in bed all alone and it was ten at night- that was when the emotions of having to do everything by herself flushed forward and she began to cry. Why was it that she let him ever take the raise and the promotion to boss? _

_She clamped her eyes shut and curled into the fetal position under the covers of the empty bed, feeling so awful, so cold and __**so**__ empty. She didn't understand why he was doing this to them. He was barely home anymore, barely willing to talk to her, barely willing to stop work for the needs of their one and only child. She was afraid that Lucy would grow up without knowing him like she should have. _

_This wasn't what she envisioned when Jasper proposed or when she spent all those hours in labor with him by her side. This wasn't her fairytale life. This wasn't how she wanted her baby girl to learn about unfailing love or about happiness in a marriage. This was quite the opposite. She was destroyed emotionally and she only talked to her husband- the love of her life- for approximately three hours weekly. And that was if he wasn't busy. _

_It wasn't that Jasper was oblivious to her feelings. It was just that he was busy and she __**knew**__ that, but the least he could do was spend time with her and Lucy. The least he could do was try to be the man she knew he was, somewhere deep down beneath that business suit and tie._

_She fell asleep crying and woke up with her arms around Jasper's pillow, almost like she was trying to tell his pillow how she felt. _

_He wasn't home. He wasn't ever home when she woke up. And if she was asleep when he got home, he didn't wake her up. She __**hated**__ this. _

_Maggie sat up and looked at the clock to see that it was seven. Another day, another twelve hours of being Mommy, another night alone. She didn't know how long she'd be able to keep this up._

. . .

Everything had been going so well. There was always someone giggling somewhere in the enormous place called home and there was _always_ someone singing. But somehow that changed overnight. Now it was quiet, not a good quiet, a bad quiet. Like there was something seriously wrong in the world bad quiet. But not that he _knew_ what his house was _always_ like. He was barely home to even prove it was his to begin with.

Jasper almost didn't want to know what was going on when he entered the kitchen and saw boxes. He didn't know what _could_ have even been going on even if he was in the loop. Boxes typically meant leaving or moving and last he checked, he was still married and he still had a family to take care of. It wasn't him leaving, was it? Maybe it was her? No, if it was her, then he'd have a lot of problems.

"Maggie?" he called curiously. Jasper stepped over to one of the boxes and looked inside to see that she had packed away clothes. _Clothes_. Those only came when someone was leaving immediately. His heart racing, he continued through the house, almost tripping on more boxes on his way to the closed bathroom door. He knocked at it softly. "Maggie?"

The door didn't open and there wasn't a single sound even muffled through the wood. He twisted the doorknob and it allowed him to open the door to see her sitting on the floor, with her back against the tub and her head in her knees that were being cradled to her chest with her arms. He closed the door and slid down beside her, not having the slightest clue as to what the hell was going on.

She didn't move at all, which was the creepy part of this whole thing. She just stayed very still. He knew she was still living because she was breathing, but she didn't even acknowledge him being there. Jasper didn't touch her. He didn't know what would happen if he _did_ touch her, so he didn't.

"Mags, what's going on?" he asked very softly. Finally, after a minute of nothing, she lifted her face to look at him. Tears were still falling, even when she threw her legs flat down on the ground.

"Jasper, I'm leaving." Why did everything have to be so surprising with her? Lucy was a surprise when she told him, the fact that she was working as a part time book editor from home was a surprise, and now this. _Leaving_. She was leaving him. Questions and then confusion all bombarded his mind.

"Why are you leaving?" Maggie pressed her hands against her thin waist and shook her head.

"Because I can't do this anymore. I can't be the only person who takes care of Lucy and… and everything. I'm just _so_ tired, Jasper. _So_ tired." He still didn't understand what she was doing at all.

"So you're giving up on us? You're just going to leave me with our daughter and you're not going to at least give it a chance at working?" Maggie sighed and turned to face him more.

"I gave you _so_ many chances, Jasper. I told you that I'm tired and you just keep putting it off like I can handle everything life throws at me. I'm not Superwoman, I can't do everything. I can't keep playing this game." Jasper closed his eyes when she stood up and stopped her by grabbing her hand.

"Where are you going to go?"

"New York… DC…I don't know. I'm just- I can't be here right now." She wiped at her eyes with her free hand and he shook his head.

"Don't go Maggie. We can work this out-"

"No we can't Jasper," she snapped, exasperated, "I've tried to and… this isn't good for Lucy."

"And you leaving is? How is you leaving going to help anyone?" Maggie didn't say anything. She just shook her head and gave him one last look before removing her hand from his grasp.

He wasn't sure where everything came crashing down. It could have been overtime, but was it possible it was something that happened recently? It was quite possible, actually. He didn't want to know what the moment was, but if it was going to save his marriage, he was going to find out soon or she was good as gone and so was his life.

Jasper left the bathroom and found Maggie kneeling in front of their four year old talking to her in a hushed tone. He stood there quietly and tried to listen, but it was kind of difficult with everything going on in his mind. Lucy looked at him once and he smiled weakly at her, which made her do the same for a moment before looking back at Maggie.

"Ok, be good for Daddy?" Maggie asked their little girl. Lucy nodded and Maggie pulled her into a hug. "I love you, Lucy."

"Love you too Mommy," Lucy said softly. Jasper didn't want to watch this happen. He couldn't believe it was _actually_ happening either. He had always thought that they'd be together forever without any problems. He didn't even know how it was his fault that she was leaving. When Maggie released Lucy, she kissed her on the top of her head and stood up.

"Ok, go practice your dancing. I'll be back soon." Soon. So maybe she wasn't going to be gone for long. Or maybe she was lying to Lucy so there was no eruption. As that thought crossed his mind, Jasper shook his head in disbelief. He couldn't believe she'd lie to their innocent four year old. Just as if to prove her innocence, Lucy giggled and nodded before skipping up to him and hugging his leg.

"Hey Lucy," he managed to say. He was fighting any sign of emotion. He didn't want her to worry about what was going on.

"Daddy, Mommy made me a princess, see?" She pointed at herself and Jasper nodded. She was wearing the pink dress her grandparents got her for Christmas. It didn't fit then, but apparently now it did. Her hair was up and she had her tiara on her head. She _loved_ imagining she was a princess, mostly because he called her that all the time. That was one of the reasons she also loved dancing so much, because when she was watching Cinderella one day, she just- according to Maggie because he wasn't there- got up and demanded that she get lessons to dance like Cinderella.

"You look just like one, Princess." She giggled again and released his leg.

"Thank you." She was also the most polite four year old he had ever met, and he had met quite a few since she started going to preschool. He was so proud of how well behaved she was, but he couldn't be the one to say he actually made her like that. Maggie was doing all of that, he was just working six days a week, nine hours a day every one of those days with little to no vacation time.

It wasn't that he wanted to be spending most of his day away from them, it was just that his job was demanding and he had to be there sometimes and if someone had to stay late, so did he. It was just that way and he thought Maggie understood that before _this_ happened.

"You're welcome." Lucy smiled sweetly and looked back at Maggie once, prompting her to smile even though she looked completely like she couldn't smile, and then she danced away. Jasper stuck his hands into his pockets and walked over to his wife. He still didn't know what was truly happening. All he knew was that she was leaving him with Lucy and she may or may not have been going to New York. "So what's going to happen now? Are we… _done_ or are you just leaving to cool off?"

"I'm not sure," she said softly. He got close enough to her that he was close enough for a hug, but there would be no hug. She was so tense that he almost regretted coming home semi-early. Maybe this wouldn't be happening. "I'll call or… something when I know what I'm doing, but I need time." Jasper sighed when Maggie slid backwards and he was sure his heart broke into a million pieces just seeing her go like that.

"What did I do wrong?" he asked before she got to the door with a box in her arms. She stopped and turned to him.

"You've neglected every promise you gave to me when we got married, Jasper. You're not here half the time I need you to be and we barely even say two words to each other anymore. Just last night you came home so late that Lucy was upset that you couldn't see her cookies. They're just cookies, yes, but you're not here for us like you kept telling me you were going to be when I was pregnant with her. I don't feel like I need to explain myself anymore. We just need some time apart. I'm going." And with that, she opened the door and was one fifth of the way gone.


	2. Chapter 2: The First Night

**Disclaimer: I don't own Unnatural History. Lucy is mine.**

**A/N: Thank you for all of the review/alert/favorite love! I apologize for taking so long in updating, but now that school's over, I'll have a lot of time to write. Prepare for the cuteness that is Lucy… now.**

Chapter 2- The First Night

Maggie was gone a lot faster than he ever thought she would be. He had imagined what it would be like if Maggie ever just packed up and left him, but all of the ideas he'd had involved her actually having a decent reason. Just because he worked all the time didn't mean he wouldn't be willing to try and cut down on his hours. She assumed too much when she left like that. Or maybe there was something else, something that went deeper than just him not being there. Maybe she was keeping something a secret from him or maybe she was trying to make him run after her.

He couldn't do that. Not when he had a four year old he had to make sure was in bed within the next hour and not when he was all flushed with emotions like he was. There was a part of him that wanted to break down and cry about this, but he wasn't about to cry over Maggie. He had spent all kinds of time crying over her when they broke up _years_ ago and that was almost too much in itself. But there was also the hopeless romantic part of him that wanted to go after her in the darkened night after checking the GPS tracking on her phone to see where she was heading. He totally would have done that if he knew what she really left for and if Lucy was bigger and could handle being up for past her bedtime and sitting in a car for a few hours, but Lucy wasn't bigger. Neither was he.

He was sitting on his bed, his hands tearing through his hair like wild animals with no sense of direction. All he could think about was the fact that it was all his fault that Maggie up and left. It was his fault that this happened. He totally missed all of the warning signs and everything and now he wanted to fix it but he couldn't. How was he supposed to fix something like this if she wasn't there? He let out a low growl of anger and anxiety. Sometimes life sucked.

Jasper finally got up and walked out of his room and towards Lucy's. It was almost eight, meaning he had approximately half an hour to get into her bed after her nighttime bath. Depending on how she was feeling, he knew that could be difficult.

The last time he had spent quality time with his daughter was _months_ ago, when Maggie went shopping for about three hours and he was off work for a day. All they did was watch a movie together and all Lucy kept doing was talk over the dialogue. It didn't bother him; Lucy was really adorable when she was talking about something she cared about. So this whole being Daddy by himself thing seemed sort of easy, but he was afraid she'd crack and find it hard to be content with just him being there.

From the hallway, he could hear her little voice making loud exclamations and sounds that made him curious as to what exactly she was doing. He knew she was into playing before bedtime because she had bins filled to the brim with Barbie's and stuffed animals and other various items, but he had never really experienced it head on.

"Oh, no! Not pirates!" Jasper found himself smiling as he rested himself against the doorframe. Lucy was playing with a plastic boat and a Barbie doll that looked like it was a princess Barbie, which wasn't surprising knowing how she was. She waved the boat around viciously, making explosion sounds and then helpless cries as she flailed the Barbie princess around. "Someone save me! I'm going to die."

He couldn't help himself when he slid into the room quickly and got down onto the ground beside her. "I'm here to save the day." Lucy looked at him with wide eyes and a smile bigger than anything he had ever seen.

"Super Daddy to the rescue!" He nodded once in agreement and then she pushed the pirate ship at him so he could do something to it. He looked at her curious as to what she wanted him to do and then he decided that the best way to solve this problem was to throw the pirate ship into the open bin. It worked. She gushed and waved the doll around excitedly. "Oh, Super Daddy, thank you." Lucy made the Barbie doll give him a kiss on the cheek.

"It was my pleasure," he played along, "But do you hear that?" He cuffed his hand to his ear and Lucy shook her head after looking around the room like there was supposed to actually be a sound. "That would be the drums of the Bathtime Tribe. They're looking for princesses that aren't clean and they're going to kidnap them to _make_ them take a bath." Her mouth formed an 'o' and she shook her head.

"Nooo!" Her little chocolate brown orbs glistened as they stayed trained on him. Jasper was suddenly _really_ sentimental about her babyhood and how amazing she was when she was so small and could fit right into his arms so perfectly. He could still smell how she smelt after he and Maggie gave her a bath and changed her- it was one of his most favorite scents. He missed how soft her tiny fingers were when they wrapped around his index finger or his thumb and how she smiled whenever he tickled her or even when he was just with her. Now it seemed like all of that went by so quickly and there was absolutely no chance of reliving that, not with his wife gone and with no anti-aging formula.

Maggie had brought up having more kids before and he always was open to discussion, but apparently he didn't understand how she was feeling. She was feeling the same way as he was right at that second, only it was all just now coming to him and that made the fact that she was gone sting even more. How could he have let four years pass him by like that? And how could he have just ignored this feeling before?

He was forced to shake out of his trans when he realized that Lucy was still staring up at him like she couldn't believe a tribe was coming for her.

"Oh yes they are," Jasper sang, "and they're almost here."

"What do I have to _do_?" Jasper tapped his chin as if he were thinking.

"You have to get in the bath before they can get to you." Lucy sprang up from the ground and scurried over to her dresser. She pulled it open effortlessly to remove her pajamas, which she promptly began to usher over to him as quickly as her feet allowed. Jasper stood up as soon as she reached him, which made her look up at him anxiously.

"Save me Super Daddy! I don't wanna get tooken by them." Jasper smiled and lifted his little girl into his arms, causing her to giggle when he made obnoxiously loud eating sounds against her neck as he walked her towards the bathroom.

. . .

He sat on Lucy's bed and watched her collect all of her animals and creatures. She had to have at least fifty of them and she insisted on sleeping with _all_ of them. He was supposed to be tucking her in, it being almost nine and all. It took her forever in the bath because she took a really long time in telling him all about her best friend Penny and her other best friend Ty from school while she was in the tub. He was sure she had never said so many words in half an hour than she did then. He would have to ask Maggie if she kept a word count or something so he could compare because he was sure she made a record. If not a world record, it must have been a personal one.

"Ok," she sighed contentedly as she lay down in the bed. Jasper sighed too and watched her grab her giant, worn down, panda bear curiously. It was almost half of her size, but she cuddled next to it like it was completely normal. "Daddy, you can read to me now."

"What do you want me to read?" She grinned and pointed to her bookshelf. She had all kinds of books because she loved reading, especially with him when he could read to her.

"Pick one." Jasper looked at her curiously and then got up to search her bookshelf for a book she would most likely appreciate. He found it under some alphabet book from when she was three and grinned as he returned to her bed.

"Has Mommy ever read this to you?" he asked. She looked at the cover and then he flipped it open to the pictures and she shook her head, looking down at it like it was gold. "Really? She hasn't read about Narnia?" Lucy looked at him with wide eyes and shook her head.

"What's Narnia?" Jasper smiled and flipped through to the first page he would read from.

"Mommy used to read this to you when you were in her tummy." Lucy looked like she could pass out because of the new information.

"_Really_?" she gasped. Jasper nodded, proud of the new information he was providing her.

"And you liked it because you always kicked." Her little eyes widened even larger and she squeezed her bear tightly.

"Did I _hurt_ Mommy?" He was amused. Mostly because Maggie didn't tell Lucy about the story that her name came from (sort of) and because she had no idea about how babies acted when they were in the womb. It was something he assumed they talked about- them both being ladies and all. Maybe it was a godsend that Maggie didn't talk to Lucy about the nature of babies while in the womb. Maybe it was all so he could bond with her at this time of strange separation. Whatever the reason, he was glad he could talk to her about something new and interesting. It made him forget about Maggie's not being there and it also helped Lucy fall asleep about five pages into Narnia, which was a good thing.

Jasper closed the book and smiled at how perfect she looked even when she was asleep. Then, he kissed her on the forehead and made his way out of the bedroom.

. . .

He had been in his bed for approximately an hour and a half just listening to the sounds of the house at night. Nothing stirred within the walls and all he could think of was that he still had to get through another day, maybe another week, with Lucy by himself. He didn't know how. She reminded him too much of Maggie and if she ever broke down and started crying for some reason, for Maggie, then he'd be _so_ screwed.

Basically, he had no plan as to what he would be doing with her for however long it was that Maggie was gone. All he knew was that he had to keep her happy and keep her entertained at the same time. He also had to make sure she went to dance class and preschool, so that was going to be interesting when that came up. He thought about just throwing in the towel because it would be too hard, but then he realized that this is why Maggie left in the first place and if he wanted to prove something, he had to stay and do it better than she ever did.

He had his phone in his hands, his eyes glued on his thumb that was ready to hit the green button. He was thinking seriously hard about actually doing it because he didn't think he was going to be able to do this without _knowing_. Knowing where she was or how she was. Knowing if she was still mad or if she was just being moody for no reason. He missed her. He missed Maggie more than he ever missed her before. Maybe it was because she was the greatest thing that ever happened to him next to Lucy, or maybe it was because she left so quickly and with such haste that it caused him pain. Whatever the reason was, all he knew was that he needed to _know_. Jasper exhaled sharply and hit the call button. It took three rings, but it got answered.

"Hello?"

"Hey Henry," Jasper closed his eyes and put his hand over his face as he started thinking about what he was doing.

"Jasper, hey! It's been a while, is something wrong?" He sighed. It was now or never.

"Um, Maggie left and I don't know where she went and I was thinking she probably went up to see you." Jasper knew Henry would tell him if Maggie were there. Henry always told him the truth.

"Oh, yes. She's here." Jasper sighed with relief and removed his hand from his face.

"Is she ok? She didn't seem upset or anything did she?"

"No, she was just really tired. I think she might be sick or something. She wasn't acting like she normally does." He was worried now and not because she was sick, but because she was in New York, sick, and he hadn't noticed. That made him feel like crap.

"Like how? Was she just sick _looking_?"

"No, she went to sleep as soon as she got here an hour ago and she looked like she was dizzy when she smelt the fish I was cooking." Jasper shot up.

"_Wait_ wait wait, she got dizzy and she went right to sleep?"

"Yes," Henry said slowly. "Why? Is there something wrong with that?"

"Uh, no," He dismissed the feeling he had about it and shook his head as he fell back against the mattress. "But make sure if she starts like getting really sick you do something. I don't want anything to happen to her, ok?"

"Ok," He sighed loudly.

"Henry, did she say anything about me? Because I think I screwed up big time and I need to apologize somehow."

"No, she didn't say anything about you. Should she have?"

"Probably. I mean, if she was really upset about what happened then yeah. So she honestly didn't say anything? How am I supposed to fix this if she doesn't… ugh." He closed his eyes and tried to not lose it. He was pretty close to that, especially since this was his wife and his marriage that were on the line.

"Maybe she has a reason for coming here, Jasper. You shouldn't worry. If anything happens or if she says anything, I'll tell you."

"Ok, thanks Hen."

"Anytime,"

"Don't tell her I called you. I don't want her to think I'm obsessive or something."

"Don't worry, I won't." Henry laughed. It was after he hung up with Henry when his door was opened slowly. Not knowing who or what it was, he sat up and switched on his light to see Lucy holding her huge panda bear tightly.

"What's wrong Sweetie?" She stepped slowly into his room and he swore he saw Maggie in her when she spoke.

"I think there's a monster, Daddy. He won't let me sleep." Jasper sighed and glanced at the alarm clock. It was too late for monsters and he was actually planning on going to sleep, not staying up all night, so he wasn't going to deal with that even if she wasn't supposed to sleep in his bed. Besides, how was he going to sleep without Maggie being there anyway?

"Do you think you'd be able to sleep in here?" She looked hesitant for a fraction of a second, but then nodded and gleefully skipped over to the end of the bed, where she pulled herself up and crawled over to the space immediately beside him. "Well that was fast."

He shut the light off and then lay back down. Lucy's small body was tucked in right beside him, her frizzy brown hair rested against a quarter of his pillow, which made him sit up again to give her one of Maggie's pillows. She accepted it gratefully.

"Night night Daddy,"

"Night night Lucy," Jasper turned onto his side and as he fell asleep, he could feel her small hand taking his hand and playing with his fingers. She was _just_ like Maggie.

**. . . . .**

**A/N: Next chapter is going to be Maggie and things are going to start picking up. If you want to- please review! :)**


	3. Chapter 3: New York, New York

**Disclaimer: I don't own Unnatural History. **

Chapter 3- New York, New York

New York City. A place she had never been, though she really should have frequented knowing her best friends lived there. It was the city that never slept, a city that was so big and bright and full that it scared her when she first arrived.

Now, as she stood in the guest bedroom and stared out at the traffic below, she was _so_ intimidated. If it wasn't for the fact that she had slept for thirteen hours with a just few minute interruptions, she probably wouldn't be standing there and gawking at the city in its grandiosity. She probably would have been eating something or talking to Whitney or Henry because her mind wasn't a blur from what had happened in her dreams.

The problem was this: she had dreamt about Jasper and Lucy. More specifically, she dreamt about the day Lucy was born and when her husband held her for the first time, how his eyes were bloodshot and how completely exhausted he looked but how happy he was. That day was a day she dreamt of frequently. She wished it could have repeated hundreds of times even though it hurt more than she liked to admit. Just that look on his face was enough for her to want it over and over and over again.

It was the first time that she had been away from her baby for longer than just a few hours. Even when she got sick when she was just a little baby and had to be at the hospital, she insisted on staying as long as she could. Jasper was always supportive of that notion- he was just as ripped apart when they found out that she was sick.

When they brought her back home, that was around the time that Jasper started getting distant. He wasn't there all the time, he was working or he was traveling. That was when Maggie started raising Lucy all alone. But when she turned four two months ago, Maggie made him promise he wouldn't be gone for as long as he had been when she was a baby. He actually upheld that promise to the best of his capability with work being really demanding at times. She wished he wouldn't work as long as he did, but he did and sometimes she snapped on him for it when he didn't deserve to be snapped at, kind of like just before she left.

She left out of haste; she realized this when she arrived at Henry and Whitney's apartment the night before. She probably could have stayed and fixed things using words instead of leaving him in the dark about her feelings and how she wanted him so badly to be there for more time and to actually talk to her. She missed their conversations and how he made her feel. It wasn't because she was actually mad at him that she left- that was a result of PMS or something completely unrelated. She actually left because she wanted to feel that spark she had felt way back when she was pregnant and needy. No matter how wrong it was, she did it and there wasn't any way she could take it back without seeming foolish.

As the thoughts of her wrongdoings weaved in and out of her mind, she could feel hunger beckoning her. She felt the pangs as she stood there at the window in rolling waves that seemed to pull at her gag reflex and try to make her sick. She _wanted_ to eat something, but she also didn't want to appear as if she had been having second thoughts about what she was doing. Whitney and Henry were so excited to see her the moment she stepped into their amazing and beautiful apartment. She was jealous of how incredible it was and told Whitney exactly that at the first chance she had. But it wasn't home and Lucy wasn't going to be dancing around or sitting at the TV waiting for her to get up like she did on occasion. It wasn't a dream, either. This was real and everything around her was like a blanket of confusion and chaos when all she wanted was to be safe.

She also wanted a cheeseburger, screw breakfast- wherever it went. She was in the mood for grease running down her arms if at all possible and maybe if she could even fathom the idea of two, she'd have two. First, she just needed to tell Whitney. Then she'd worry about her present situation and how upset she was about leaving.

Henry and Whitney were still together, even after four years. Henry apparently loved New York even more than he loved traveling, which was good news, considering they were married. It was a sweet wedding that happened about two years after they started their seemingly perfect relationship, something she thought was a little un-Henry, but she could tell he was just trying to make Whitney's mom and Whitney happy. They were.

"Are you feeling ok Maggie? You slept for so long I was worried," Whitney questioned when she was back out in the main part of the home. It was very open, so the instant she walked into the apartment, she was able to see and be seen by Whitney easily. Maggie nodded and held her hand on her stomach when it growled at her.

"I guess I was just really tired from driving all the way here."

"You must be _so_ hungry then. Do you want anything in particular?" Her friend walked into the kitchen and Maggie sat up at the counter with her head in her hand.

"Actually, I was kind of hoping I could have a cheeseburger." Whitney looked at her like she was completely insane, which was totally understandable.

"Really? I thought you liked veggie burgers and that kind of thing." That was when Henry walked in from another room and smiled at them. "Henry, Maggie wants a cheeseburger, can you believe that?" He looked at her funny, like he was trying to fit a puzzle together in his mind, and then looked at his wife.

"Yes," Whitney rolled her eyes and looked back at Maggie.

"Then we'll take you out if you'd like to go out. I'm sure there's _someplace_ around here that has New York's best burger." Henry laughed and Maggie smiled. She was _so_ glad she had such good friends.

"That would be excellent, Whitney, but first I have to go to the bathroom, if you'd point me in that direction." Her friend pointed to where she had emerged.

"Just across the hall from where you were sleeping." Maggie smiled again and left the couple so she could go to the bathroom. She had visited it several times in the night, so it was out of politeness that she asked where it was.

The first thing she thought about when she was kneeling in front of the toilet hopelessly was the fact that she completely skipped two meals in the past several hours and the not eating was taking its toll on her wellbeing. Then she thought about the fact that she had to pee really badly and that was when she decided that she really missed home.

In considering what was going on with her body, she thought about the possibility of it being the flu because Lucy had just had the flu and she was with her all day everyday through it, so it was definitely plausible. But then there were some symptoms that didn't match, like the _constant_ need to use the bathroom or _wanting_ cheeseburgers. She barely had anything to drink lately and yet, she was going to the bathroom all the time. She hated it, whatever it was.

She allowed the possibility of there being two things wrong with her to slip in- one being the flu and the other being that something was wrong with her bladder- suddenly, she felt the nausea take over and the emptiness of her stomach was pushing its way out of her esophagus before she could even think about what was happening.

This had to be the flu. She groaned when she sat on the toilet seat cover after flushing. This was not only a bad idea, this was a _terrible_ idea. Coming to New York to get away from Jasper and _then_ finding out that she was sick: terrible. It was all her fault too. She should have noticed the simple signs before, when she was still at home.

A knock came at the door and she sighed loudly. They were sometimes too protective and too concerned about her.

"Are you ok Maggie?" It was Henry. Maggie sighed again and cleared her throat.

"You can open the door, Henry, I'm decent." The door opened and her cousin-in-law stepped in. His face wore a worried expression and his eyes were filled with emotion as he sat down on the edge of the tub across from her.

"Do you want to tell me what's going on?" he cut through the silence. Maggie shook her head and shrugged.

"What do you mean what's going on? Nothing's going on." He gave her a look and she looked down at her fingers.

"Cheeseburgers?" She looked back up at him worriedly and gave into his calm to let out her crazy, uncontrollable feelings and doubt of what was actually going on with her.

"I don't know what's going on with me, Henry, I think it's just stress and now I'm getting sick because Lucy had the flu and I probably-" Henry put his hand on her knee and looked her in the eyes.

"Do you want me to get Whitney? If you don't want to tell me then-"

"No," Maggie's eyes widened and she shook her head. "No, don't tell Whitney. I'm sure I'm fine. If I keep throwing up then I give you permission to take me to the hospital or something, but I'm fine." Henry sighed and nodded.

"Ok," She managed to smile at him even though she still felt disgusting and he left her sitting alone with her mind in comprehension mode, trying to figure out what was wrong with her. She refused to believe what kept surfacing, but in her heart she knew. And if it was what she felt, there was a chance that Jasper would get mad at her or that Henry would say I told you so. Maybe it was all in her head or maybe it was just misinterpreted signs and signals her body was giving her because of all the stress she was going through with leaving. All she knew was that it wasn't true until something or someone said it was and that hadn't happened yet, so it wasn't true.

. . .

She and Whitney were sitting in a coffee shop without Henry. He worked an odd, but convenient, afternoon/ evening shift at the museum, so she and Whitney had to explore the city alone while he worked. They ended up going to several stores, mostly because Whitney insisted that they find a present for Lucy for when she went back home. They didn't find anything, but they did end up meeting a nice small business owner at a bookstore that gave them free reading material.

The coffee shop was one with overly priced coffee and extremely rude people weaving in and out in the afternoon rush. Maggie was just having milk, which made Whitney raise an eyebrow in confusion, but Maggie was content with it. Milk was something she told Lucy was for when you got sad- just a sip of it and all of your sadness dissipated. That wasn't the case when she tried it.

She and Lucy sometimes had tea parties, her loving to be a princess and everything, but without the tea and instead they had milk, for a completely different reason than sadness. It was one of those moments she wished she could capture in a picture, but she couldn't and instead had memories so deep that she could still smell the way the strawberry scented shampoo wafted over from Lucy's hair when she bounced around the table trying to make sure everyone got their tea.

"Are you alright?" Whitney asked. Maggie bit her lip and nodded.

"I was just thinking about when Lucy and I have tea parties," Maggie laughed softly to herself at the memories. "Lucy is dead set on being a princess when she grows up."

"Aw, that's so sweet," Whitney smiled. Maggie nodded.

"It's all Jasper's doing. He calls her Princess _all_ the time and now she loves princess movies and having tea parties and dancing. She's incredible, though, Whitney. You should come visit us sometime." She nodded quickly and laughed.

"Of course, just as soon as I can take time off of work. You know, I'm thinking the only way I'll ever be able to get out of it will be through maternity leave, but we all know that won't be happening quite yet, so I'm stuck here until it does." Maggie sighed. It wasn't that she didn't care, she really did. But how could Whitney just wave around maternity leave like it was nothing? She knew from experience that it was awful being pregnant most of the time, so she didn't understand why Whitney would want it- aside from the obvious benefits and the many joys of having someone to take care of other than yourself. She must have made a face or had been quiet for too long because Whitney changed subjects after looking at her apprehensively, "_But_ I managed to take today off so I could talk to you and spend time with you and it's been worth it, but you never told me what's going on with you and Jasper. Do you want to talk about it?" Maggie _did_ want to talk about it. She couldn't believe it had taken almost a full twenty four hours for her to get it out of her system.

"It's just that we've been married for four years and for about three and a half of those I've been the one doing all of the work with everything. Lucy practically doesn't know Jasper, I mean- he's there and he _tries_ to be her dad, but it's different because he's hardly there to begin with and Lucy's not used to him as much as she should be." Maggie bit her lip as she began to tear up. "I guess the problem is that he's not being a dad and I need him to be that for her and I need a husband, I don't need someone who's just sleeping next to me every night." Whitney nodded and the second Maggie said what she had said, she regretted it. She regretted all of it- coming to New York, leaving them… none of it made her feel like she had done justice to the situation. None of what she had done was good for anything, just like Jasper said. He was right and she was wrong and now she was too ridiculously emotional for even attempting to admit her true feelings to anyone.

"Then you need to stay here for a while, Maggie. Give Jasper time to get to be that for Lucy and then you can go back." Maggie knew she was right. Maybe that was why she left in the first place- to give Jasper a second chance at his father-daughter relationship with Lucy.

"I kind of think our relationship is broken Whitney," she blurted out. The writer stared at her silently and unmoving for a second and then she slid forward in her seat.

"What do you mean by broken?" Maggie took a deep breath and her hands pressed against her face to try to calm herself down. It didn't work.

"I don't know. I don't feel like we're actually married. It's more like a mutual friendship that's legally bound together." She contorted her face and Maggie sighed. She probably shouldn't have said _any_ of that. She regretted almost everything at this point. Everything except for allowing herself to sleep for thirteen hours- that was something she actually found good out of all of this.

"Well, I guess because you're here, you're trying to get him to prove himself to you. You want him to come after you and tell you that he wants you." It sounded right, but Maggie hated to think it was. She'd seem so selfish if that were the case. The thought of it being right made her emotional and she began to cry again.

"I don't know what's wrong with me, Whitney," she said shakily, "I'm all over the place emotionally and I think I'm sick… I don't know." Maggie didn't see it with her hand burying her head, but her friend pulled out her phone and typed something into it before she stood up to sit beside her and give her a hug.

"It's ok Maggie. I have just the thing that will make you feel better. Tomorrow, you're coming to work with me. I have a feeling you'll feel better once you get your mind off of everything that's been going on." She truly hoped so.

. . .

Henry got the text message when he was sitting at the security desk waiting for his supervisor to arrive. Whitney made him learn how to text because they needed to be able to talk during the day, so he understood what the letters and numbers she wrote to him in meant.

"911 m bad pms. Pln a." He exhaled and nodded to himself. Plan A started now.

**A/N: Blah- I'm so so sorry this took so long. I had writers block and then I was sort of busy this weekend when I actually wanted to update, so I'm so sorry for the delay. I should have chapter four done soon and I hope I'll be able to get it up by this weekend, fingers crossed.**

**In the next chapter, it will be going back to Jasper and Lucy, where we will be seeing all kinds of Daddy/Daughter moments along with at least some (I haven't decided how much yet) of the Henry/Whitney plan. I was a little apprehensive on updating this chapter, so if you liked it, let me know because that would definitely make me feel better. **

**Reviews are amazing! Thanks for the lovely reviews from last chapter- you're all **_**amazing**_** and I thank you for your kindness and your commitment to my writing. :)**


	4. Chapter 4: Pudding

**Disclaimer: I don't own Unnatural History.**

**A/N: Yay! Fast update. Ok, so towards the end of this chapter (not the very end, but a little bit before it), you might be confused at what's going on, but I'll be explaining it in further detail as the story goes along. For right now it's going to be under wraps and secretive, though. I promise it will definitely be worth it.**

**Thanks for reading! :)**

Chapter 4- Pudding

Jasper woke up because his alarm was going off, A, and B, his daughter was sprawled halfway across his body. He opened his eyes weakly and grimaced as the pain that was in his lower back from Lucy's persistent kicking in the middle of the night settled in.

His left hand was pinned to his side because of Lucy's weight and his right was free, so he moved it in order to shut the annoying buzzer off. It was almost six in the morning at five forty five, the usual time he woke up for work. There was no way on earth he was going in, though; he just forgot to shut it off the night before. He slipped upwards as best he could with Lucy sound asleep with her arms all over him and her head resting under his shoulder.

He struggled for a moment in his half-awake daze. Jasper didn't know what to say or do so he could move. All he knew was he hurt and he was still tired, but he had Lucy to take care of in a matter of hours. How he was going to handle this was tough, but he knew that if he was ever going to prove any points about how he could do this parenting thing by himself that he'd have to stay home with his daughter.

At first, he was very gentle in moving Lucy's arms off of him. She peeled open her eyes and looked at him through their early morning squint as she forced her body to remain on him.

"Daddy?" He hushed her and used more of his strength to move her over. She wiggled to roll over onto her stomach and boost herself up and look at him, her eyes still narrowed with tiredness.

"Go back to sleep, Princess. It's ok."

"What happened to Mommy?" she asked softly. He frowned and tucked back some of her hair before she rolled back over.

"She went to go see Henry and Whitney." Lucy didn't move or respond at first and then, she turned over and sighed into his side. "What's wrong?"

"Did Mommy go 'cause of _me_?" Jasper shook his head.

"No, Sweetie, she didn't leave because of you."

"Then _why_?" Jasper sighed and, despite the fact that his arm was kind of in pain from earlier, he pulled his arm around her to bring her closer to his body.

"Just go back to sleep, Goose," he said softly. "I promise I'll be right here when you wake up."

. . .

The morning had gone sufficiently well because, apparently, he made the best pancakes she had ever tasted and she got to keep her jammies on even though it was almost noon. He was only letting her do everything and anything Maggie never let her do because she woke up upset again about Maggie not being there, which in turn made him feel responsible and therefore responsible for making her feel better. _That_ was how they ended up at the animal shelter later that afternoon.

It started out fairly harmless that morning after breakfast. Lucy pranced around the kitchen singing a song about flowers or something that only she would sing about while he cleaned the dishes. His back was still really sore from her feet wrecking havoc during the night, so all the leaning forward only made it hurt more. Now he knew why she had to sleep in her own bed. But other than his back hurting and the dishes getting cleaned by him, it was pretty normal and he didn't have any problems with letting Lucy sing because she was hyper on sugar anyway.

The thought of taking her to the animal shelter came when she made a barking sound and then he thought about how when he was really small, probably her age, he had a dog. His name was Cinnamon and he was a beagle. Things went well with Cinnamon until his dad accidentally let him out and he ran away- he was never seen again. Not only did the thought of Cinnamon make him want to get a dog, but so did the fact that Maggie told him that they shouldn't get a pet because Lucy would probably kill it with kindness or she'd let it out when no one was looking because she thought it should be outside. He didn't think Maggie knew what it was like to have an animal and since she wasn't there- what an opportunity he had. He could break all kinds of rules, get away with it, and make Lucy happy. It was like a three way win.

"Hey Lucy," Jasper caused her to stop flat out and she stared at him excitedly. "Do you want to go see a surprise?" That only made her more excited and she jumped up and down repeatedly, causing her bare feet to make clicking noises against the hardwood floor.

"Yes! Yes! _Yes_!" she squealed. He laughed and pointed towards her room.

"Then go get your clothes on and we'll go." She danced away to her room and he just smiled because his little girl was the most adorable four year old on the planet.

Now they were at the animal shelter. Lucy was petting almost every creature she set her eyes on and exclaimed how nice they were when she touched them. The other people there were all smiling at her and some even told him how lucky he was that he had a well behaved little girl. He was. He really was.

"Nice puppy dog," she said sweetly to a golden retriever puppy. Jasper looked at the woman, Erin, who was helping them find a dog and she smiled.

"Do you like this puppy?" Erin asked Lucy. She looked up at the red head and nodded.

"He's _nice_." Erin grinned and they both watched when Lucy lifted the dog into her arms. The woman turned to him and started explaining things to him while he kept a watchful eye on both her and Lucy, on again off again of course.

"His name is Pudding. He's been with us for about three months now- we rescued him from a car accident, actually, which is why this front leg is prosthetic." Jasper nodded and looked down at Lucy, who was now kissing Pudding on the head and stroking his fur lazily. It was obvious, but the question had to be asked.

"Lucy, do you like Pudding?" he asked. She looked up at him and then at the dog in her arms and then at him again.

"He's nice, Daddy. I _love_ him." Jasper nodded and turned to Erin again.

"I think we'd like to take Pudding home,"

. . .

She squealed loudly when Pudding pounced on her and sent her to the ground in the middle of the living room. They had only been home for about two hours when it happened, which was surprising because he thought it would happen much sooner.

The whole way home she let Pudding crawl around in the back seat, which wasn't exactly supposed to happen, but he let her do it because she was _this_ close to tears when he told her no. He had a weak spot for crying, it so happens. Pudding seemed to love Lucy, which was a really good thing because the last thing he needed was a puppy as rowdy as this one that didn't like her.

"Daddy," she laughed, "Daddy, he's licking me!" Jasper stepped so he was standing over her and lifted the puppy from on top of her.

"Alright Pudding, don't lick Princess Lucy." He started licking his face and Jasper sighed when Lucy giggled. He set the dog down and pulled Lucy up to her feet.

"Daddy, can we watch Cinderella now _please_?" He nodded. They had talked about watching Cinderella during the car ride from the animal shelter, which was sort of strange to be doing because they just got a dog, something she could have probably spent a million years playing with without running out of things to do, but she loved Cinderella so he wasn't going to tell her no to that either.

"Ok," She clapped and spun around excitedly, per her usual, just as he heard his phone going off somewhere in his bedroom.

"Hold on, don't let Pudding do anything, alright? Don't let him go outside or _anything_." She nodded solemnly and he rushed away so he could find his phone. He caught it on its last ring, thankfully, and sat down on his bed to answer. "Hello?"

"Hey Jasper," It was Henry. His heart skipped a beat, immediately thinking something else had happened to Maggie or that something else was happening in general like maybe Whitney got into trouble or he was hurt.

"Henry, is everything ok? Is Maggie-"

"Maggie's… fine, Jasper. I'm calling about something else." He was curious as to what and he could feel his heart pounding with every second that passed. Henry wasn't very reassuring when he said Maggie was fine.

"Ok, what would that be?"

"Whitney yelled at me," he said softly. "So I was hoping I could come and stay with you until she's ok."

"Why would she yell at you?" Jasper asked in disbelief. Henry and Whitney were literally the ideal marriage, so he didn't see how they could or would even argue. He and Maggie, they were a totally different case. They were pros at fighting each other and making up, so it was normal for them to be arguing, but Henry and Whitney- that was just wrong.

"Because we're having a hard time talking to each other. She thinks I'm ignoring her and I'm _not_, I'm just trying to get some quiet time, but she keeps talking to me about things I don't understand like I do and I don't." Jasper didn't understand at all, but he wasn't going to not allow his cousin a place to go to get away, so he exhaled and ran his hand through his hair.

"Um, ok? I guess you can come, but just remember that I have Lucy and Pudding that are-"

"Pudding?" He laughed and nodded to himself. Pudding _was_ kind of a weird name for a dog.

"We just got a puppy and his name is Pudding."

"Oh,"

"Yeah," Henry sighed loud enough that he could hear it. When Henry didn't say anything else, Jasper tuned his ear to the rest of his house and heard Pudding bark and then Lucy talking to him. The words were sort of blurred, so he didn't know what she was saying, but he had a feeling it had to do with Pudding being nice. "Listen, Henry, feel free to come down. Lucy and I are going to be here pretty much all day and night until Maggie comes back, so we should be here when you get here. Are you sure she's ok- Maggie?"

"She's fine, I think." Jasper was about to question him further, but the doorbell rang and barking and Lucy's scolding's made him not able to go there. He had bigger problems.

"I have to go, someone's here and chaos has taken over my daughter." Henry laughed and Jasper smiled, glad he could leave him on a high note rather than a low one.

"Ok, I'll see you soon I guess."

"Definitely. Thanks for calling, Henry," He started walking out of his room when the dog stopped barking and Lucy stopped talking. Something about the quiet meant trouble, which also meant that he'd have to take care of the situation. He walked faster when Lucy started calling out for him in the most fearful of ways, something that pulled at his heartstrings and made him sort of anxious.

At this point, he had hung up with his cousin and was standing in the living room where the front door was wide open and Lucy was standing by it looking at him with wide eyes. He shook his head at her in confusion and she just pointed to the outside, where a person was standing.

The woman at the door was familiar, very familiar in fact. She was his secretary and he was about to approach to talk to her, but Lucy started running up to him and hugging his leg like she was scared out of her pretty little mind.

"Daddy," she whispered, "Pudding ran outside when I opened the door."

"Why did you open the door?" he asked her. He was trying to retain his anger. He told her that she wasn't supposed to open the door, did he not? And since when is it ok to answer the door when a stranger was there? He could have yelled at her, but he could tell she was upset for letting the dog out in the first place and now that there was a person there, that was even worse for her mind to comprehend. She was probably freaking out more because she didn't know how he'd react, so he knew he couldn't make her feel like she had done too much wrong. He just had to correct the problem and make sure she knew what she did was wrong.

Lucy started crying, which made him kneel down beside her and tuck back her hair so she could look at him.

"Princess, what did I say about letting Pudding outside?" She shook her head and he nodded when she spoke.

"Not to,"

"Right, so go get your shoes and I'm going to talk to this lady before we go look for him, alright?" She smiled and nodded, prompting him to smile too. She had the sweetest smile he had ever seen in his life, it reminded him of Maggie and in turn the fact that she was gone, but it dissipated as he moved on.

Jasper stood up and Lucy went running towards the kitchen, where her shoes were waiting for her. He walked over to the door and looked at the woman cautiously.

"Sorry about that, I'm trying to be Good Cop _and_ Bad Cop while Maggie's gone. Do you think I did ok?" She smiled and shrugged.

"I'm not one to be lenient, but I think you did just fine." He nodded, feeling accomplished, and clasped his hands together.

"So what are you doing here, Becky? I called you didn't I?" She exhaled sharply and shook her head.

"Jasper, you missed three meetings, three _vital_ meetings, and I know you said-" He held his hand up to stop her and she pressed her lips together into a tight line.

"I'm not going in until next week, you know this, right? I'm staying home with my daughter until my wife comes back or something gets figured out between us." He had told Becky all about his predicament on the phone that morning, while Lucy was sleeping and he couldn't get back to sleep. It helped him ease through the awful tension he felt about it all and she actually was quite helpful when it came to telling him if he was doing the right thing.

"I know, but tomorrow our biggest client is coming in. Do you think you can maybe try to come?" She bit her lip in obvious hopefulness and Jasper struggled. He didn't want to lose a client, but he also was on mommy duty so he wasn't going _anywhere_. He loved his daughter too much to leave her with Henry, and anyway- who was he to miss Lucy's dance class for work?

"Can't do it, Becky. I have Lucy and I have a dog that has just gone missing, so I'm not going anywhere even if the President of the United States came in and wanted to talk to me for some reason. Put Eric on it, he's good." She sighed.

"Are you sure?" she asked frantically. He was a _little_ freaked out by her antsy behavior, but he knew Becky and this was how she was. "Eric's the one who wanted me to come see you,"

"Well, Eric doesn't get it, I guess. He can handle it, can't he? I thought he was ok with dealing with clients." He was now exasperated. He couldn't believe Eric would bail out on him. He and Eric were very close, especially since they ran the whole company together. He thought for sure he'd be able to pick up for him while he took a single week off so he could do what he had to. He had done the same a lot of times for him. What happened to give and take?

"He _was_ until he got his arm st-" She suddenly stopped talking when Lucy came up to him and tugged on his shirt.

"Yes?" Jasper looked down at her and she beamed up at him.

"Daddy, can we go now? I want to find him. He's probably sad." Jasper exhaled and patted her on the head.

"In a minute, Lucy. I have to take care of something, so why don't you go wait for me in the kitchen?" She bobbed her head up and down, smiling all the way as she started running towards the room in question. "Ok, what happened to his arm?"

"He got his arm stuck in a door in the middle of a meeting," He sighed. They weren't supposed to talk about their work in public, but this was getting ridiculous. Using code? It wasn't like anyone was listening other than him anyway, so he didn't understand her cautiousness.

"Becky, how could Eric get _shot_ in the arm? What was he _doing_?" he asked in a whisper-yell. Her eyes widened and she shook her head as if asking him to stop talking about it. "Seriously, do you really _want_ me to come in tomorrow? I'll come in, but I have a little girl who is going to be all by herself for hours. Do you want my wife to be even madder at me than she already is?" Becky shook her head.

"No, Sir, I would hate that." She shoved her glasses up the bridge of her nose more and leaned forward. "What do you want me to tell them?"

"The client?" She nodded and he bit his lip. "Tell them I'm on vacation. I can't go in and see them until next week at the best possible time."

"Alright, it's done, Jasper. I'm sorry to bother you at home, Eric insisted and I couldn't refuse." He nodded and tossed his hand at her.

"Its fine, Becky. If anything else comes up, feel free to stop by. I don't want to deal with a client, though, so don't bring them here. It wouldn't be safe for my daughter anyway." She nodded firmly.

"Of course, Sir. I'll make sure no one knows what's going on with you. You're on vacation until next week at the earliest." Jasper smiled.

"Ok, so you're going to go now." He started closing the door because Becky was also a bit on the awkward side when it came to leaving people alone.

"Oh, wait- I got a phone call from your dad this morning. He wanted to know if you were still going to go see him." Jasper hissed as if he burned his finger on a hot pan and winced, tugging the door back open slightly.

"I'll… I guess I'll go see him this week. If he calls again, tell him I'll be down by Friday at the latest and let him know I'll be bringing people."

"You've got it, Jasper. So I'll see you next week, maybe later?" He nodded and she smiled pleasantly. "Personally, I think you should just quit and do this full time. Your daughter seems to _really_ love you and I can tell you're really good with her. It's better than what you have to do every day, isn't it?" He exhaled and something in his heart told him she was exactly right.

"Thanks Becky, you're the best." He gave her a quick hug and then, told her goodbye before shutting the door and returning to Lucy and their search for Pudding, the weight of work flying off of his shoulders with every step he took.

. . .

"Henry! Henry! Henry!" Lucy clapped and slipped off of the couch to greet her godfather at the door. Jasper just smiled and Henry laughed as he plopped himself down to meet her at eye level and give her an enormous hug. It was late for Lucy, probably nine at night. They had been up until seven searching the streets to no end, calling out the name of their new dog, but they didn't find him anywhere.

He only let her stay up so late because she was crying and he knew that if anyone, Henry would be able to help her feel better.

"Hi Lucy," Henry said to the little girl. She smiled sweetly as she backed away from the embrace and looked up at him.

"Daddy let me stay up," she explained excitedly. "We were watching TV and we're gonna sleep in the star room 'cause Mommy says I can't sleep in there." Henry laughed and looked at Jasper, who nodded. Lucy was kind of a blabber mouth, this he had just learned minutes ago.

"Yeah, so Henry, you must be tired, right? We have about a thousand different places you could sleep tonight, but Lucy and I are having a sleepover in Maggie's room upstairs. She wants to see the stars because Maggie doesn't let her go up there very much." Henry nodded and looked at Lucy as he rose to his feet.

"Can I sleep up there with you guys?" Lucy clapped again and took Henry's hand.

"Let's go, Henry, up the stairs to sleep in the star room!" Jasper shrugged when his cousin looked at him desperately and Lucy started babbling on about the star room again. It was going to be an interesting night.

. . .

"Daddy," Lucy drawled from her position on the inflatable mattress directly under the skylight. He was lying on the couch and Henry was curled up in his hammock in the corner of the room. He could tell Henry was annoyed with Lucy, because she had been talking for a while and he hadn't said a thing for about half of that while.

"Yeah Lucy?"

"Why are there so many?" He looked down at his daughter curiously.

"Why are there so many what?"

"So many stars," she said dreamily. "Why are there so many?" Jasper looked up at the window and sighed. He didn't really know the logic behind it, but she was going to keep asking until she knew the answer- or at least his answer.

"Because everyone has at least one star," he informed, "like you have one and I have one and Henry has one."

"Does Mommy have a star?"

"Yeah, Mommy has a star." Lucy was quiet for a second and then she sat up and looked at him.

"Is this like a sleepover? 'Cause my friend Penny was having one and I couldn't go 'cause Mommy said it was bad." Jasper laughed once and nodded.

"Yeah, this is a sleepover." Lucy nodded and smiled sweetly. Then she suddenly dropped her smile and became serious, "Tomorrow is dance," Jasper got up from his position on the couch to sit beside her on the ground. She wasn't going to sleep and he needed her to. _Desperately_.

"Princess, you need to go to sleep," he said in a whisper. Her eyes widened and she pushed her finger against her lips as she threw herself down on the mattress. She shot back up instantly and talked, _again_.

"Can we go see Gramma soon? I want to say hi to Gramma." He couldn't help but smile. She had a sweetness about her that was contagious.

"Were you and Mommy going to see Gramma?" She nodded and yawned. "Well, we can't go see Gramma because _you_ have dance tomorrow. C'mon, lay down and I'll read to you again if you want me to." He gestured to her makeshift bed with the book he had brought upstairs with him and had grabbed from the floor beside his foot. She sighed as soon as she was inside the safety of the blankets and cozied up next to her giant panda.

"Is Pudding going to be okay?" Jasper exhaled and ran his hand over her soft hair.

"Pudding will be just fine, Lucy. I bet in the morning he'll find his way back here to get to you." She smiled.

"Can we look for him 'gain if he doesn't?"

"Yeah, we'll go look for him again. But not until after dance, ok?" Lucy nodded and yawned, tiredness obviously finally settling in for the night.

He didn't have to read to her for her to close her eyes and fall into a deep sleep. She was out before he could even comprehend what was happening. He kissed her on the forehead and shook his head in complete amazement and realization that he had made it through one full day.

"I love you so much Lucy," he whispered to her sleeping figure. "_So_ much,"

_One day down, but how many to go?_


	5. Chapter 5: Radio

**Disclaimer: I don't own Unnatural History or anything else.**

**A/N: Hello readers! I'm so sorry it took a month and a half to update, but I'm lazy when it comes to summer time **_**and**_** I had writers block for what seemed like forever. It was **_**the**_** most annoying thing I've ever experienced. I literally couldn't write anything if I wanted to. But never fear- I'm back and with a long-ish chapter! I should have the next chapter up much more quickly than it took me with this one because I have it written and all I have to do is edit it out. In fact, I have actually written several chapters, so I'm probably going to update **_**very**_** soon.**

**I seem to have made a timing mistake in the last chapter. When Jasper says Friday he means **_**next**_** Friday, seeing that that chapter takes place on a Friday. This chapter takes place on a Saturday as does chapter 6 and then it's pretty straightforward from there- hopefully. I don't even know why I have to have dates associated with these chapters, but in my mind that's how I keep things orderly, I suppose.**

**The first half of this is probably the lamest thing ever (but I hope not because that would stink… a lot), but it will have a purpose in the future. The ending is really a part I labored over for too long, mostly because of my stupid writers block, but I hope you still like the chapter as a whole even if it's not my personal best. I promise the next chapter is going to be much better. The next Maggie chapter should be much better too, because of what happens at the end of this one. **

**And, because it's kind of a big part in this chapter, I have never in my life ever been to a radio station, so if the information is incorrect, blame TV and movies and the like.**

**Your questions (and concerns about Pudding) will be answered in due time, so I won't answer them quite yet. :)**

Chapter 5- Radio

"Whitney!" Maggie laughed. "What are we doing at a radio station? I thought you worked for a newspaper." Her blonde friend smiled at her widely and tugged the door open.

"_Well_, on Saturday mornings, I host a radio show. I figured you'd like to come see how a radio station works, so here we are: my second home." They walked into the building and immediately, people were saying good morning to she and Whitney like they knew exactly who they were. Obviously they knew Whitney, but Maggie was flattered and somewhat confused at the amount of greeting she got aside from the fact that she looked emotionally drained and she had never in her life been in this radio station.

"How do all of these people know who I am?" she asked when Whitney finally took her into a small office towards the back of the building.

"Oh, I talk about you all the time. In fact, I have what I call a Maggie Segment on the show." Maggie's jaw dropped and she shook her head slowly in confusion. Her face must have been contorted into disgust, because Whitney laughed. "I'm just kidding, of course not. I just sent them an email last night to tell them to be nice to you because I was finally bringing you in. They know about you because Henry _always_ comes in with me and the one thing he ends up talking about is Lucy and Jasper and you. It's funny sometimes. He loves talking about Lucy and how pretty she is, especially when he shows pictures that you send us. He really loves Lucy, Maggie. You made the right decision in making him her godfather." Maggie knew she did. Henry was the one person she knew hands down would be the godfather of her baby the moment she found out. He was the one she wanted making a positive impact on her life from day one and she knew he was doing just that.

"Where did he go anyway? I thought he'd be back." Whitney pursed her lips and looked at her computer for a moment.

"Um, he went on a trip. He should only be gone for a few days. Promise," For some reason, she didn't believe it. It was probably the fact that he left as soon as she and Whitney got back to their apartment. The whole exchange was slightly coded and Maggie felt as though she were just starting to watch Lost in the middle of season four: an impossible feat without knowing a hundred different things beforehand.

"Oh," Maggie sighed. She fiddled with her ring while she watched Whitney type at her computer and then, out of nowhere it seemed, the blonde looked at her with a grin.

"Ok, guess what? We go live in ten minutes so we have to go right now or we'll get yelled at for not attending the preparation meeting." She stood up and Maggie was flustered when she started dragging her, literally, down the hall and towards a room with an on air sign above it that wasn't on, not yet anyway.

. . .

For some reason, Maggie was sitting patiently at a microphone. Whitney was sitting next to her and then on the other side of the glass was her producer, Todd. Maggie did _not_ want to talk at all and she didn't understand why Whitney was having her do this. During the preparatory meeting, they discussed what would happen and it included Maggie being introduced and maybe her answering some simple questions that Whitney had prepared. It was going to be cake, according to Todd, and Maggie only started worrying the moment the clock hit fifty eight after the hour, two minutes to show time.

"Do I really have to say anything?" she asked softly before the show started.

"_Maggie_, don't worry, you'll be fine. If it doesn't work out, you don't have to say much else, but I'm sure you'll do excellent. You're made for radio with that voice." Maggie nodded slowly and Whitney flashed her a smile. Then, as the clock hit fifty nine after the hour, she spoke again, "Remember, all we have to do for the next three hours is play some music and talk to listeners- that's my specialty. I talk to listeners that call in and I try to help them through their problems. Maybe you'll be able to help me if you're up to it." She sighed and nodded, finding herself agreeing even if she was still uncomfortable with the idea.

It didn't take long for the first word to slip from her mouth. It came immediately, almost, when Whitney was introducing the show and that she had a special guest. Maggie wasn't shy about it, but she didn't want to talk on the radio. It wasn't something she woke up that morning and hoped for, so she was kind of flustered and therefore she held back a little.

"Good morning," Maggie said to Whitney as if she had just walked into the room when she was introduced.

"So Maggie, tell us one thing about yourself- one thing you love." She could tell that Whitney was prying Lucy out of her, so she played along. It was the least she could do.

"I have a little girl named Lucy," she said with a smile. Just thinking about Lucy made her smile, so it wasn't to make herself feel better, but because she was thinking about the child she loved so much. "She's four years old. She actually just turned four two months ago and you, Whitney, are her godmother." Whitney laughed softly and spoke with a nurturing kindness that warmed the room and places around the state in which her voice could be heard.

"That's right, I am. So if you were to have a parenting or a marital tip for our listeners, what would that be? Since it's not every Saturday morning we get to have you on, of course." Maggie bit her lip and paused.

She swallowed, looking at Whitney through the corner of her eye as she debated what she would say. She didn't take too long to respond, though, because she knew there were people listening and if she took too long they'd think something was wrong.

"Um, I know this is going to sound really bland and overused, but I would say that patience is key and if you can master patience, then you should be able to take care of anything, really. Patience is something that applies to more than just being patient with your kids; it also applies to yourself and your spouse. I mean, where would ninety nine percent of marriages be if the wives yelled at their husbands for being late or for forgetting to fold the laundry? I'm pretty sure they wouldn't exist. Stuff just happens and you have to be forgiving for it."

As soon as it came out of her mouth, she realized how pathetic she must have sounded to Whitney. She just gave people advice that she herself couldn't own up to. That put her in the column of probably emotionally disturbed in Whitney's mind. If she were Whitney that's where she'd put herself, so she wouldn't blame her if she scolded her for her hypocrisy.

Whitney cued up a song and then she looked at Maggie in awe, "Wow, where did you learn how to do that?"

"I know… I'm just so-" Upset with herself, she tugged the headphones out of her ears and wheeled towards Whitney in her chair so she wasn't anywhere near the microphone.

"No, you did perfect, Maggie. That was amazing. I mean, even though you were completely hypocritical and I don't approve of that, the advice was perfect. I couldn't have done better if I wanted to, and for your first time it was fantastic." Maggie found herself smiling and Whitney did too. She actually kind of felt like she was doing something right for once, aside from the two-facedness.

. . .

All morning long, Maggie took phone calls after delivering such an "inspiring" and "helpful" piece of advice to start the show off with. People asked her a variety of questions, ranging from the simplest things to more difficult familial issues that she just barely scraped up answers for.

She was genuinely floored at the amount of appreciation and love she had received over those three hours. But she didn't understand why these people couldn't just look up their problems in parenting magazines or on Google- that was how she learned everything she knew. She liked knowing she could help people just the same, though. It felt _right_.

The best part of it all was that she only was hypocritical once. After that first bit of falseness, she veered away from saying things that would make her seem fake because she didn't like how it made her feel- like a bad person, basically. Whitney seemed to approve of her change in direction greatly as she began to smile more and nod in agreement with what she'd say.

Her stint was exactly that- a stint. She refused to make anything more of it and she mentally took note that she would go home before a week went up because she couldn't possibly make it through another show without scratching up her dignity further.

"Am I allowed to stop taking calls?" she finally asked as soon as the last caller hung up. Whitney laughed.

"Yes you are, but obviously all of New York and New England love you, so why don't you just write a blog or a book and get it over with?" She was teasing, it was quite obvious, but Maggie actually considered the idea. That is, just until she considered the fact that she'd probably end up becoming too involved in her writing and would have to leave Lucy to pursue the dream.

"Wait, did you say New England? Meaning I can get this show in Connecticut?" Whitney nodded. "Whitney, why didn't you tell me? I would have listened."

"Well, we _do_ play music that Lucy might not be allowed to hear, so I was just being careful. Henry would never allow it anyway; I'm almost a hundred percent certain about that." Maggie allowed the idea to cause her to nod and agree.

"So I guess we should get going then, all of this talking and answering questions is making me hungry." Whitney raised an eyebrow.

"But you've been snacking all morning. Are you alright?" Maggie rolled her eyes.

"You and Henry are both too concerned with my health. I'm fine, Whitney. If I wasn't ok, then you'd know by now."

"Mhm, so why were you throwing up both this morning and yesterday morning?" She sighed.

"Whitney, I'll be fine. It's probably just stress and anxiety taking a physical toll on my body. I promise that if it keeps happening, I'll go see a doctor, but I'm fine, really." Whitney was giving her _the_ stinkiest stink eye she had ever seen and Maggie suddenly felt defensive. "Whitney, really. If something was wrong, you'd know by now."

"Maybe I'm saying I _do_ know by now, Maggie." She watched as her friend gathered her things and rose, leaving her to her thoughts for a moment, and just a moment really, before she left the room and her exciting morning to the next DJ.

. . .

Maggie clutched the basket in her hands tightly, her knuckles whitening at the amount of pressure she was exerting on them. Her eyes darted nervously around her, at that old woman at the cash register she was positive was watching her, at the bags of chips lining the wall, at the twenty-something brown haired man that looked just like Jasper in the freezer section of the small store. Avoiding what she was standing in front of was what she was attempting, but it just made it seem more conspicuous, she was sure of this.

It was really Whitney's fault. If she hadn't given her the death glare that was worse than the one back at the radio station, she wouldn't have been at the small grocery store at ten at night.

The conversation took place just two hours ago, after Whitney returned from a strenuous day at work and Maggie just… well, she just slept and watched TV. It wasn't productive at all and she felt kind of guilty, but what else was she supposed to do? Whitney woke her up when she switched the TV on again so the volume was loud enough to wake almost anyone in the vicinity.

Maggie sat up in a panic, confusion striking her at first, but after seeing Whitney and that the TV was on, she no longer felt that way. "Whitney, what… what time is it?"

"It's almost eight," Whitney was giving her _that_ look again and she felt her stomach twist at it. "Are you ok? Naps at this late of an hour aren't normal. If I knew any better I'd say you were-"

"_Fine_. I'm fine," she said stubbornly. Whitney plopped down next to her on the couch and lifted a bag from the coffee table.

"I brought Chinese." Maggie nodded subtly and quietness fell upon them in a heavy, expectant pause. She took the container of food from her when she handed it over, but the only sound was that of the Seinfeld marathon that was running on the TV.

Finally, Whitney broke the awkward silence and turned to her. "You know, Henry thought that your symptoms might be signs of something you should take a test for. Something… something you and Jasper might need to get back together for." Her eyes widened and her stomach churned, causing her to stop eating completely.

"_Whitney_," she drawled, "no, I'm not pregnant." She tipped her head to the right as she shrugged.

"You're throwing up and sleeping during the day for extended periods of time, not just snoozing off- _really_ _sleeping_. You're getting dizzy and having cravings, you're eating _all_ the time- doesn't that seem like there might be something going on with you?" The knot got tighter and she shook her head in denial.

"No, I'm not. I can't be."

"And why not? Maggie, if you won't admit to the symptoms, then who will? Do you want to be pregnant and be treating your body wrong?"

So _that_ was why she was in the middle of a tiny grocery store on the corner of a busy street at ten at night. The five or six other people in the room _weren't_ looking at her, but it sure did feel like it. And to make matters worse, she was wearing her lazy clothes from when Lucy was still a baby and she was too lazy to put anything on. Maybe being lethargic all day was bad for her after all. She shook her head out of the thoughts she was having and focused on the task at hand.

Shaking hands grasped the box on the shelf and she quickly moved it from out in the open to deep into the basket under the three bags of unnecessary chips. _No one's watching you, calm down- stop freaking out. You can do this._

Closing her eyes and exhaling, Maggie turned to the checkout counter and the old woman that reminded her of her Nana. It wasn't over. She still had to get past the woman and face the uncomfortable silence that would kill her from the inside. But then it would be done, then she could leave and breathe again. _No one's watching you. No one's staring at you. No one can see through you._

She placed her basket on the dirty gray counter and the Nana-lookalike smiled at her and asked her something about if she found everything. Maggie uttered out a yes and then looked back at the wall behind her as she lifted the crinkling bags of Frito-Lay product out of the bright red plastic. _No one can see through you. No one can see through you._

With each agonizingly slow movement, Maggie's heart raced faster and her hands became sweaty and even shakier. Everything seemed to be watching her, even though she knew they couldn't be. The clock, the woman, the man in the freezer section that looked just like Jasper, and the camera that glared down at her. It felt like she was a convict or a runaway. It wasn't like people never came to the store to buy a pregnancy test, but this was something she was desperately hoping she wasn't, and if she was then she'd feel _very_ guilty for it.

If people were staring at her it was because she was stubborn and refused to believe something that had been floating around in her mind for weeks. It was because she left her little baby girl with Jasper, someone she cared for greatly no matter what her mind wanted to tell her, and because she was trying to make a point even if the point didn't need to be made. If people were staring, they had a good reason to look down at her and spit on her feet. She wasn't portraying the person she was and she wasn't comfortable with it. She knew she had done wrong and this little trip to the store _wasn't_ helping.

When she pulled the box out of the basket, Maggie was sure she was mocking her. The second she looked into her aged and wise eyes with nervousness oozing out of every pore on her body, a small grin appeared on her face as if she were thinking something about the fact that she was buying a box of pregnancy tests and chips. She probably shouldn't have bought so many chips. _Just breathe, she won't tell anyone- she's like eighty years old anyway._

Maggie took her own advice and breathed. It helped, but only slightly. She paid the woman quickly and effortlessly, ripping the plastic bag from her almost too hard. She needed out of the stuffy and all-eyes-on-her store. She needed to get outside, to the air of the bright night and to the apartment again.

Her feet hit the pavement quickly, her strides accompanied by the swinging of her arm against her side. The air was cool. A breeze blew at her hair gently and sent it flying backwards as if she were in some dramatic home movie. It would probably be something Jasper would think up if he had spare time, she thought.

Maggie took a deep breath as she crossed the street and just as she made the turn to start up the street to the apartment building, she ran straight into someone. It sent her bag flying to the ground and her clumsiness kicked in, pushing her into the man whom she bumped into further and almost causing both of them to land on the ground. Lucky for her, he was sturdy and could catch them both before they dropped to the rough cement ground.

"I'm so sorry," she apologized again and again before she could even look at him. She sturdied herself back on her feet and he picked her over-full bag off of the ground. When their eyes met and his fingers brushed lightly against hers as the passing of the plastic bag occurred, she instantly knew running into him was bad luck.

He was about thirty years old, but her idea of how old he truly was could have been greatly affected by the lighting on the street and everything she was feeling at the moment. His dark hair was cut similarly to Jasper's, only the back was trimmed significantly better. His blue eyes shimmered in the light and a smile crossed his seemingly perfect lips.

Not one wrinkle graced his tan-ish skin, nor did a sign of human emotion aside from the smile that portrayed his forgiveness. Maggie didn't know the man, but she did think he was too… too. He wasn't the kind of person she'd talk to on a normal day and he most certainly wasn't one she wanted to run into. But she was still standing there, still as a statue, and his eyes were locked to hers and she still _wasn't_ moving.

"Mrs. Bartlett," he said kindly, as if he knew her and had known her since forever. Maggie's heart stopped and she began to clam up, and even though she was fully capable of moving, she wasn't budging. It annoyed her more than anything at that moment. "I've been tracking you down all day." The man put his hand on her upper arm and smiled.

Her mind was invaded with thought, but she only could manage to say one thing, not really thinking about it before it came out, "I… I'm pregnant and I know how to defend myself." It wasn't necessarily the truth, _yet_, so she was technically lying to him. She didn't know _who_ he was or how he knew what her name was, but she wanted him to leave her alone as quickly as possible. She was using the sympathy technique. It didn't appear to be working.

The man chuckled and nodded, "Allow me to introduce myself, Maggie. My name is Paul and I'm your husband's boss." Paul pulled his wallet out of his pocket and showed her a photograph of him standing with Jasper at an unfamiliar place. It was almost as if he was trying to prove a point that couldn't be proved easily, like there was a giant back story she had missed out on and now he was trying to catch her up in a few seconds. He was trying to gain her trust, whoever he really was, and he assumed a photo of him and her Jasper was going to gain it. The picture was enough, she believed him. "Here, if you would take this, I want to be in contact with you." Paul handed her a business card and she looked at it for a moment before looking up at him again.

"Why do you want to talk to me? Why can't we talk right here?" He smiled. There was something about his smile that made her uneasy- like he was up to absolutely no good, almost. A part of her believed him, though, which is why she stayed and listened.

"Because, Mrs. Bartlett, I can't risk the information I'm going to be disclosing to you being heard by the wrong ears. If you would call me later tonight or perhaps tomorrow, I'll make sure I'm available for you to talk to me. Please call,"

"But what is it that Jasper does that's so high profile?" she snapped, suddenly kind of angry and frustrated. The man merely placed his hand on her shoulder and looked her in the eyes.

"All of your questions will be answered if you call me, I promise."

**Please review!**


	6. Chapter 6: Dance, Babies, & Phone Calls

**Disclaimer: I don't own Unnatural History.**

**A/N: Ok, so I'm incredibly behind… **

**Thank you so much for all the love last chapter- I was a little worried I'd lose everyone, but that didn't happen. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I know it's been much too long since I've updated and I'm really sorry for that- I've been really sort of busy with school and all those shenanigans to edit, but I had time to today, so I wanted to make sure I got this out there before I let another week go by. **_**And**_** its super long, so maybe that makes up for lost time? I really am sorry for the delay!**

**Review if that's what you want to do. :)**

Chapter 6- Dance, Babies, and Phone Calls

_It seemed kind of like it was a dream. For some reason, it was still really dark, but there were voices. At first, there was a deep and hushed man's voice, whispering something hastily that he could barely make out in the fogginess of the supposed dream-state._

"_Ok? So will you do that for me?"_

"_Yes," Instead of the man's voice, this time it was a quiet little girl's voice that sounded like Lucy. But, like most dreams, he couldn't move and rather than even trying to say something, he mumbled out what ended up being a groan, which only made the man talk again._

"_Ok, I'll wake you up in the morning." And just like that, his dream went silent again, only to weave straight into a dream about Maggie._

. . .

The floor beneath him was hard. It was a _little_ unnerving because, well, he hadn't fallen asleep on the floor and now he was on it. He opened his eyes to the light that signified the morning's arrival and he turned slightly to also take note that his daughter was no longer sleeping where she had been when he tucked her in.

An unrestrained and unintentional grunt was released as he pushed himself up off of the floor into the sitting position. If his back hurt yesterday, today it was going to give him hell. He didn't know what he was doing on the floor or how he managed to get onto it without waking up, but it happened, and he wasn't happy about it in the least. For one thing, he wasn't fifteen years old anymore and his body needed a soft and comforting place to lie, especially after what happened the night before this one with Lucy's feet practically living there. And for another thing, he would have had to been on drugs to not wake up after a fall like that. There had to have been something that happened that made him get there.

Jasper was still rubbing the back of his head when a sudden eruption of giggling came from the couch beside him. He turned to look at her, squinting at the morning sun that was streaming into the room from windows all around. She was sitting there with her messy morning hair and the biggest smile on her face, like she was _so_ proud of herself for making him get onto the floor.

"How'd you get up there, Princess?" She smiled even bigger and wiggled her toes while she stretched her arms out to touch them. It was something that strangely reminded him of Maggie all over again, as if dreaming about her wasn't enough.

"I climbed up here."

"And so you pushed me off of the couch? How'd you do that?" He managed to stand up and she looked up at him, continuing to giggle very loudly. "Someone's got a case of the giggles this morning." Jasper leaned down and lifted her up so he held her like she was a big baby. He then proceeded to blow raspberries on her tummy and make her laugh so hard that she squealed and made him look over at where Henry had been sleeping the night before. His cousin was gone.

When Jasper looked back at Lucy, he began remembering things that made his mind become a playground for games, and not good ones- ones that made him feel like he was a really bad person.

He used to make her laugh like she was all the time when she was little, like two or three little. He hadn't realized how much he missed it until that second, which is what prompted the mind games. _If only he stayed. If only he didn't work._ He couldn't handle the thoughts and he was almost ready to give up already and just take his life back to where it should have been by calling Maggie and admitting that he was really the weakest person ever and that he needed her as much as she needed him. But he couldn't do that.

"Daddy, _Daddy_, make me some chocochip pancakes." Lucy demanded when he set her back down on her feet. He laughed, amused by her random request, and shrugged. He had made her pancakes the morning before with a promise that he'd make her chocolate chip pancakes sometime, but he didn't mean the next morning, not really.

"Ok, Lucy, let's go make some chocolate chip pancakes." He took her by the hand because she practically demanded that too and she started singing about chocolate chip pancakes. It was an interpretive song about how excited she was that she was making breakfast with her daddy and how she hoped they tasted good. She was pretty much the cutest thing ever.

They found Henry in the kitchen when they entered the room together. An awkward eye contact was exchanged, mostly because Henry was on the phone and Lucy was still singing. She was seriously the happiest and most excited kid he had ever seen, which was only a boost on his ego because she also happened to be _his_.

"Ok. I understand." Henry was saying. Jasper eyed him curiously, knowing that Henry had left because of Whitney, this was kind of strange. He didn't know who else he would have been talking to, so the fact that he was on the phone to begin with led him to believe that it was Whitney. But who else could he have been talking to? Maybe he had been thinking way too much about everything that had been going on, but he was kind of suspicious.

"Lucy," Jasper made the small girl stop singing and she looked up at him. "Henry's on the phone."

"Shh," She put her index finger on her lips sloppily and Jasper looked back at Henry only to see that he was no longer on the phone.

"Hey Henry," Jasper was the first of the three to speak.

"Hi Henry!" Lucy sang energetically as she strutted up to him. With a single look, Jasper could tell that there was something going on with Henry that didn't have anything to do with Whitney. There probably wasn't even a problem with them. Henry probably just came to do something. But what? And why would he lie to him?

"Hey Lucy," Henry smiled and gave her a high five. She then turned to him and put her hands on her hips.

"Daddy, we halfta wash our hands afore we make chocochip pancakes." Jasper smiled.

"_Right_," He moved a chair from the kitchen table to in front of the sink and she climbed it to wash her hands when he turned the water on for her.

"Are we gonna find Pudding today?" she asked after he had her scrubbing her hands together with soap. "'Cause I miss him,"

"I'm sure we'll find him today, yeah," Jasper coaxed up a reassuring smile, though he wasn't sure if they'd be able to find Pudding at all, and rubbed his hand over her hair, causing her to laugh sweetly and smile at him.

Yeah, he was pretty sure he loved her more than ever.

. . .

Her fingers latched onto his shirt tightly as he walked her up to the doors of the dance studio. It was a nice building, near the ice cream place he had been to a few times. It was the first time he had ever been to her dance class though, so he was a little apprehensive about everything. They only found the place because Henry had done some searching in Maggie's office and found a receipt or something with an address on it.

Before they came, she seemed like she was so excited for dance class. She showed he and Henry her latest technique that she had to learn for class and she kept babbling on about her teacher and the people in her class like they were the greatest people she had ever been around, ever.

She was only as good at dancing as she could have been. Seeing that she was constantly dancing around the house it was fairly good. She definitely didn't have Maggie's clumsiness out of all of the traits she'd inherited from her. But now, she was clinging to him and seeming like she didn't want to be there at all.

"What's wrong Lucy?" he asked softly as he pulled the door open. She looked up at him.

"Daddy, Mommy sings my song afore I go inside. Can you sing it please?" Lucy was giving him the puppy dog eyes. He didn't know what he was getting into, but he stopped opening the door to pull her over to the side and talk to her more.

He had never ever seen her like this. Jasper knelt down on the ground so he could look into her eyes and learned that she wasn't even willing to do that.

"What's wrong? Are you scared to go in?" She shook her head and finally looked at him.

"I dreamed Mommy tooked me to dance and she's not here so I'm sad." His heart dropped. He probably should have anticipated this, but how could he have? She had seemed so happy before.

"Oh," Jasper exhaled and took each of her small hands. "I think that if you go in there today, when you come out and we get back into the car, I'll let you talk to her. How does that sound?" A smile crawled across her lips and after a second, she broke into a full out grin.

"Ok," He smiled and nodded.

"Alright, so can you do this? Do you still want me to sing to you?" She shook her head and gave him a tight hug around his neck.

"Thank you Super Daddy," His heart throbbed within his chest but he managed to smile at her when she pulled back.

. . .

He got Henry from the car and forced him to sit with him in the room of mom's that were waiting for their kids that were in the class. For a while, he watched through the glass that showed everyone what the class was doing, but like everyone in the room was on their phone or talking. How they did that was a mystery. But, he was still almost a hundred percent sure that something was going on with Henry. He just had that gut feeling, and being who he was, he was going to get an answer.

"Henry, who were you talking to this morning?" Jasper asked nonchalantly. He was kind of uncomfortable in his chair, so he was really trying to get comfortable as he caught the look Henry shot him, one that was accompanied by a shrug.

"Whitney," He didn't seem emotional at all about that. Yep, there was something going on.

"Ok, spill. What's going on? You're not seriously just here because of some marital problem. What is it?" Henry looked hesitant to respond to him for a second and then shook his head.

"If I tell you, you have to promise you won't call anyone."

"Um, like who _anyone_?" His cousin shrugged.

"Maggie," Almost immediately, Jasper answered with an obvious disgust for what Henry had said.

"Oh, yeah, _no_. I'm not calling her for a while." Henry looked like he was easing up to him and finally, he got relaxed in his chair.

"Ok, this morning Whitney called me and told me that-"

"Excuse me," A woman sat down beside him all of a sudden and he was drawn to look at her. She was staring at him like she had something to say, so he allowed her to. "Are you with Lucy?" He nodded.

"Yeah, why? Did she do something wrong?" She laughed and shook her head.

"No, I see that you're holding her shoes and I had to know," He didn't know what to say to that, so he nodded slowly in response. "I'm Grace, Penny's mom," Finally, familiar turf. He nodded with definition as he shook her extended hand.

"I'm Jasper," She smiled pleasantly.

"It's nice to meet you, Jasper. And you're…" She gestured to Henry and Jasper fumbled in his seat to look at his cousin.

"Henry," Grace smiled.

"It's nice to meet you both. Are you Lucy's dad's?"

"_What_?" Jasper honestly didn't understand where she'd get that idea and he got chills thinking about his relationship with Henry in that way. "No."

"We're cousins," Henry explained simply, gesturing between them. Grace nodded slowly and pursed her lips.

"Well, Maggie doesn't talk about who she's married to, or anything about her family really, so that leaves me to assume, especially since you're _both_ here and she's _not_. Is she alright?"

"Um, she's fine." Jasper said quickly, his grip on the arm rest getting slightly tighter with each thought about Maggie. "She's visiting New York for a while." Grace suddenly looked to the seat beside her when a small cry was heard and then she lifted a small baby into her arms, one wrapped in a blue blanket and a blue hat.

"Really? I didn't know she was planning on going to New York. Is everything ok?" Jasper couldn't keep his eyes off of the little dude she was holding. Why didn't _he_ have a son? Not to be selfish or anything, but he _did_ kind of want one- one to talk to and to explain computers to. He didn't even care if he had to give the talk or anything. He practically had to do that for Lucy already, so he was ready for anything.

"Oh, um, yeah, it was just spur of the moment. She wanted to just get away for a few days." Penny's mom pressed the infant against her shoulder and gently patted at his small backside, causing him to feel even more jealous of her. It was strange that an everyday event like dance class could evoke so much emotion in such little time.

"Oh, well I hope everything's ok. Is she feeling better? On Thursday she said she was having headaches." Jasper didn't know a thing about Maggie's health, let alone the headaches, so no, he didn't know. All he knew about her was that she was sleeping a lot, getting dizzy, and apparently she was having headaches. What else?

"Oh, yeah, I'm sure she's fine now." He was a really bad husband.

. . .

After another fifteen minutes of talking with Grace and clarifying his relation to Maggie and Lucy and Henry, her phone rang while she was in the middle of getting her baby, John, to sleep. She looked at him anxiously and he volunteered to hold the baby until she got back from taking the call.

It felt incredible holding a baby again. And this was a baby boy, so it was even better. He _knew_ how to get babies to sleep. Of course that was pretty much it- but he was learning, so he rocked John slowly, never once breaking eye contact with him.

Maybe telling Maggie that he wasn't ready for another kid wasn't the truth. Maybe he was. He did know that he wanted a son eventually and he also knew that Maggie had been practically throwing herself on him in telling him that she wanted to give him that. He seriously missed her and her crazy like there wasn't anything else in the world for him.

The more he thought about it, the more he realized that his family wasn't exactly complete. It felt empty. Of course, it was empty because of the separation, but still. He was thinking ahead, to when Maggie would obviously come back to him and Lucy. But what if she didn't?

"Henry, is Maggie seriously ok? Do you think she's going to be ok?" Henry shifted in the chair, but Jasper didn't look at him.

"That's what I was going to tell you about before Grace started talking. Um, Whitney called me and told me that Maggie was throwing up again." That caught his attention. He was all for the getting space thing, but not the whole being sick thing and not doing anything about it. That crossed the line from ok to unethical.

"And she won't go to a doctor, will she?" he offered, looking at the man beside him. Jasper let out a sigh and shook his head when Henry nodded once to respond. "That's my Maggie."

"She thinks she's fine, Jasper, but we all know she's obviously not fine." He nodded in agreement with him and sighed.

"Well, is this your plea for me to go to New York? To save her?" Henry gave him a look, but he knew that he caught on by the way Henry didn't respond. "I can't do anything about what she does or doesn't do, Henry. This is a her problem, not a me problem. I can do _this_. I can be a dad and make it work. Maggie just needs time to figure herself out and _maybe_ we'll get our life together back, but I seriously don't want to screw anything up right now by being forceful with her."

No more words were exchanged between him and Henry. In fact, Henry physically removed himself from the room and went back outside to the car. That left him deep in thought until a familiar presence sat back down beside him.

"You're really good with him," Grace said softly. Jasper smiled and looked down at the kid, who was fast asleep.

"Maggie used to say I have a special power or something," Grace took John from him as he held him back out to her.

"Well, you're welcome to put John to sleep anytime you come to dance class or preschool. Are you bringing Lucy to school on Monday?" He shrugged. He had planned on going to DC and he knew that Maggie was going to bring Lucy at some point, but he had no idea about what she was planning on doing about school.

"I was actually thinking about bringing Lucy to DC. Did Maggie say anything about that to you?" Grace looked like she was about to respond, but two little girls dressed up in their dancing uniforms came skipping up to them right at that moment. One of them was his; the other must have been Penny.

"Daddy, Miss Hannah said I did _perfect_," Lucy gushed. Jasper smiled.

"_See_? What did I tell you?" She scrunched up her nose happily and he held her shoes out for her to take and she did, only after turning to the little girl beside her and grinning.

"Daddy, this is my friend Penny." Lucy pointed to the other little girl and Jasper smiled at her.

"Hey Penny," The girl waved at him shyly and Grace laughed.

"It's ok, Penny, it's just Lucy's Daddy." Lucy suddenly climbed onto his lap and he looked at her to see that she was putting her shoes on. On his lap. That in itself was enough for him to smile. "It was nice meeting you, Jasper. Tell Maggie I said hello when you talk to her."

"Ok," Jasper waved as Grace lifted the car seat the sleeping baby was resting in and headed to the door.

"Daddy, when can I talk to Mommy?" Lucy climbed back off of him and he looked at her cautiously as he stood back up.

"Um, how about when we get into the car? I'll let you use my phone." Lucy nodded and was unusually quiet while they walked back out to the car.

"Can we have a tea party, Daddy? With lots of milk 'cause I'm sad." Jasper opened the car door and she climbed inside.

"Why are you still sad?" he asked, confused. She let him pull her buckle on through her car seat and he waited for her to answer.

"'Cause I miss Mommy," As simple as it was, he knew how deep that actually went. It meant _I miss Mommy because you're not like her at all_. Jasper sighed. He knew this was coming because of what had just happened earlier and he didn't want to see her more upset than she was right then. That would probably be chaotic.

"Yeah, I miss Mommy too," he admitted softly.

"When is she coming back?" she asked slowly. He looked down at the floor of the car. He didn't know. Was it better to lie to her and say _soon_ or was it better to say_ I don't know_?

"I'm not sure," Lucy suddenly erupted into tears and he closed his eyes with a heavy sigh. He was _not_ good with tears either, especially those that came from his four year old that he was supposed to be making sure didn't cry. "Hey, don't cry, Princess, its ok."

"Pudding went bye bye too," she sobbed, "and Mommy went bye bye and-" He understood. She was upset because she thought it was her fault that Pudding and Maggie left. Jasper frowned and wrapped his arms around her even though it was uncomfortable and awkward.

"It's going to be ok, we'll find Pudding, Lucy, and Mommy's going to come back to see you soon." Jasper moved back and she stopped crying as she looked at him sadly.

"Promise about Mommy?" He cringed. She made it specific.

"I promise."

"Thank you Daddy," she said softly. Jasper smiled and pulled his phone out of his pocket.

"Ok, don't tell Mommy anything that I said, ok? About missing her? Don't tell her about Pudding either." Lucy looked confused, but he knew she understood, so he dialed Maggie's cell and handed the device to his daughter. It was probably going to backfire, he knew it would. They waited a few moments and then, she shook her head, handing him the device again.

"Mommy didn't answer," Jasper sighed and stuffed the device into his pocket.

"Well, we'll have to try later, ok? Maybe she's sleeping or something." Lucy nodded and he closed the door to the vehicle with a large breath of air. He needed to sit down.

. . .

He and Henry were sitting at the table with Lucy's giant panda bear and one of her large dog stuffed animals while she placed tea cups in front of each of them. According to her, Maggie told her that milk was good for sadness, especially at teatime. It was probably one of the things he agreed with Maggie on.

"Teatime!" she said happily. Henry looked at Jasper like he really wanted out of it, but it was his choice to come to see them, so he wasn't letting him out of it even if the world was coming to an end. Besides, if milk was supposed to make your sadness go away, then Henry could have used a lot of it.

"Tea, Henry?" Jasper asked when Lucy waved the milk-filled teapot at him.

"Oh, yes, please." Lucy smiled and poured him some, almost getting some on the tablecloth in the process. Jasper was about to tell her to be careful when, seemingly out of nowhere, the phone rang. He pounced up and Lucy's small eyes widened as he walked over to the phone cradle.

"Who is it? Is it Mommy? Is it _Mommy_?" She clasped her hands together and stared at him intensely as he checked the caller ID. It wasn't Maggie. It was her parents' number. With the shake of his head, he answered the phone and successfully got Lucy to know it wasn't Maggie.

"Hello?"

"Oh, _hello_, Jasper," It was her mom. He smiled. He hadn't talked to her in _forever_.

"Oh, hey Mom, how are you?"

"Daddy," Lucy began to try to get his attention. Jasper exhaled and shook his head and anxiously gave Henry a look. "Daddy is that-" Henry got her to stop talking to him and he tried to listen to the woman on the other end wholeheartedly.

"I'm well. Is everything alright? Maggie's not picking her phone up,"

"Oh, yeah, everything's fine. She probably just has it off."

"Do you think I could talk to her?" He bit his tongue and looked at the table at which Henry was whispering something into Lucy's ear. That was a _little_ weird.

"She's… not here, actually. Maybe I can help?" As he listened to her speak, he walked back over to the table and took his seat again, eyeing Henry and Lucy slightly. _Since when was Henry the kind of person to tell secrets?_

"I was just going to ask her if she was still coming down with Lucy next week. She said she'd call me by today to talk to me about it, but she hasn't." Jasper hummed curiously before he spoke.

"Well, I guess she wasn't planning on it, but maybe _I_ could bring Lucy down. I have to go to DC to see my dad anyway, so it wouldn't be a big problem." He watched as Lucy stared right at him. She then hurried around the table and curled up onto his lap forcefully.

It was only a little bit uncomfortable, mostly he felt awkward about the whole thing, but it was what it was. She was sitting on him with her head against his shoulder and her hands patiently against her waist. He put his arm around her so she wouldn't fall and checked her face to make sure she wasn't crying because of what Henry had told her. She wasn't- she was just sitting there. _Weirdest _moment of his adult life, right next to that one earlier where someone actually thought he was _with_ Henry.

"You don't have to do that…" she tried to protest. Jasper didn't get what it was with Maggie and her mom and thinking it would bother him to do things. Honestly, it had to be a gene.

"No, really, Mom, it's fine. I'll see you on soon then, right?" He was rushing the phone call, yes. He just didn't want her to freak out when he told her that Maggie was practically non-existent, _and_ Lucy was heavier than she looked.

"Daddy," Lucy whispered, "can I talk?" He shook his head. There was something about how she rested so pleasantly on his lap- as if sitting there was normal and good. It wasn't right.

"What about Maggie? I know you're busy with work-"

"Daddy," She demanded louder.

"Shh," Jasper hushed her and exhaled. "Maggie's in New York," Jasper leaned back in his chair. He rubbed the back of his head with his free hand and watched as Lucy contorted her face in upset and crawled off of him, hurried out of the room, and towards her bedroom. Henry took a sip of his milk. It was all too strange for it to be coincidence. Henry had something to do with whatever that was.

"_Oh_,"

"It's not a big… marital problem or anything," He purposefully lowered his tone as he spoke and then shook his head, "I mean, we're fine, but she wanted to get away for a few days and clear her mind or something. Um, so tomorrow or sometime later? I'll see you then?"

"Yes, you will. I hope everything will be alright between you, I'd hate to see little Lucy separated from you." _What did __**that**__ mean? _Jasper agreed weakly and said goodbye to his mother-in-law before hanging up and setting the phone on the table while staring off into the distance.

"Who was that?" Henry asked.

"Maggie's mom,"

"Oh," Jasper nodded slowly and put his hands over his face as he groaned.

"Henry, everyone's against me." His cousin laughed.

"No they're not," Jasper gave him a look after he placed his hands back on the table. "You just need to prove yourself to Maggie and then everything will be back to how it was."

"And how do you propose I do that?"

"What if you quit your job and stayed home with Lucy?" Jasper considered it, but only for a second, before he responded.

"No, I can't quit. Do you know how much money I'm earning?" Henry snorted a laugh and Jasper shook his head with confusion.

"Why is money all you care about? Don't you care about Lucy and Maggie?"

"Yes, but how else are we supposed to-" Henry lifted his phone up and Jasper's eyes immediately flew to the line on top of the mobile news site as he spoke them, "Maggie Bartlett- best new radio co-host in the northeast? What does that mean?"

"It means that Maggie _needs_ you to stay home."

The day was pretty much a failure- he still had zero idea as to the real reason why Henry Griffin was at his house and people were making him feel like crap for everything, most of it going back to Maggie and the fact he was trying out being a dad for once. This wasn't going as well as he thought it would, but at least Lucy was happy. Right? No, not really.


End file.
